An alternative to getting lost at the lagoon [see story on Page 14] this weekend is to get misplaced with drum ’n’ bass DJ Makoto and MC Deeizm at Luxy tonight.
“I have bought and played loads of Makoto’s stuff,” said Miss Represent, one of the UK’s finest drum ’n’ bass DJs who toured here in February, “and his production quality is amazing, which is really important for the drum ’n’ bass sound.”
“MC Deeizm has a gorgeous voice, they work really well together and are an asset to the scene,” said Miss Represent. “I only hope that one day with us touring internationally our paths will cross and we get to play together.”
Tokyo-based Makoto Shimizu, who is known for using funk and jazz elements in his slickly produced drum ’n’ bass, started off as a rare groove DJ.
“One day I heard Goldie’s Inner City Life and [Bukem’s] Logical Progression and I totally fell in love with it. I couldn’t believe I felt the sound was so advanced and future ... since then I have got really into all kind of drum ’n’ bass.”
“He is highly educated with an Acoustic Engineering major at Nippon University, and technically skilled,” said Marco Lapka who after seeing Makoto play live in Sydney in 2003 booked him for Luxy.
Production-wise Makoto was originally into acid jazz, his dad a prodigious collector of jazz vinyl. After spending some time trying to recreate the drum ’n’ bass sound he sent off a copy to several well-known producers. The only one to get back to him? LTJ Bukem. After receiving some advice Makoto tweaked and refined and ended up signed to Bukem’s Good Looking Records in 1999.
“I left them a few years back, so I really don’t know what happened,” said Makoto, diplomatically, on rumors of difficulties with getting new material out on Good Looking. “I have been trying to set up my new label called Human Elements. Hopefully I can start releasing this year.”
“I think the kind of drum ’n’ bass I do definitely needs a musical MC,” said Makoto, introducing Shelley Debenham, aka MC Deeizm, the only female to make it from Good Looking. The southern English belle is an all-singing and rapping MC who often works with Makoto and has toured extensively with him after being introduced in 2003, by Bukem. “She has an amazingly soulful voice,” said Lapka, “and like any good MC, knows how to accentuate the sounds the DJ is playing, when to bust out a cool rap or when to let the song go on its own.”
“We have been working together for five years now,” said Makoto. “We know each other well ... I know what she does at the gig and she knows what I do.” Understatements aside, check out the links below for a sneak preview of this awesome couple working it together.
If you are one of the lackluster people who leave after the main event for that extra hour of sleep, you will miss the closing DJ, local boy Spykee. Don’t. He is top draw, and has been listening to his drum ’n’ bass again so his set could be especially interesting now that he is switching styles a little from his usual indie dance rock. “Luxy knows I also play the other styles in my set,” said Spykee. “I think that’s why they booked me this time ... I’ll drop some Afrobeat, dirty bass, electro, drum ’n’ bass and also the hottest dubstep.”
Log on at http://tiny.cc/Lr4dG for a sample of Makoto and Deezim at work.
Makoto and MC Deeizm at Luxy, 5F, 201, Zhongxiao E Rd Sec 4, Taipei City (台北市忠孝東路四段201號5樓), tonight from 10pm until 4:30am. Admission on the door is NT$600, or NT$300 with a drink should you wear a white top.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist